Text Size

-

+

reset

“He went to the doctor recently, and the doctor told him his heart today is much younger than it was even 10 years ago,” she said of her father. “So that thrilled me, because selfishly I want my dad around for a really long time.”

Clinton was once famous for his voracious appetite —he “prefers the stuff with fat in it: jalapeno cheeseburgers, chicken enchiladas, barbecue, cinnamon rolls and pies,” read a 1992 New York Times article. But after a quadruple bypass surgery and further complications, he ultimately became a vegan.

“I’m very grateful that my father decided to get healthy; that he didn’t need my mom [former Secretary of State and possible 2016 presidential candidate Hillary Clinton] or me to pressure him to do that,” Chelsea Clinton said.

“He’s probably the world’s most famous vegan,” she added. “He walks four times a week, diligently, wherever he is in the world. And he’s so determined to be an advocate for other men, and men in particular, to go to the doctor as he did when he started to not feel well, and then to make the necessary changes in their lives so hopefully they can live a long time.”

She credited his health issues with leading to the Clinton Foundation’s involvement in tackling childhood obesity.